There are three main approaches in counselling these are the Humanistic, Cognitive Behavioural (C.B.T) and Psychodynamic. Within this essay I want to identify and describe some of their key concepts starting with the Humanistic Approach. The Humanistic Approach or (Person Centred Therapy) began in the 1950’s due to theorists views that there were limitations within the prior two approaches of C.B.T and Psychodynamic. The two main theorists associated with this movement are Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers who believed that humans were innately good and possessed a drive towards growth and fulfilment called self-actualization. Abraham Maslow based his findings of this on healthy people who had found a meaning to their life that gave them fulfilment thus achieving self-actualisation and noted that a hierarchy of needs had to be met beginning with basic needs like food, water, air etc. He believed that if a deficiency and a need cease to be satisfied the motivation to strive higher or maintain growth is lost and problems can occur. Carl Rogers although agreeing with Abraham Maslow also felt that to strive for self-actualization and be able to overcome their problems they needed to be in a genuine environment. In this environment they could open up whilst feeling unconditionally accepted and understood, here they could realize their full potential. To provide this therapeutic environment Carl Rogers states that three core conditions are needed:- • Congruence: - being transparent or genuine showing the Client that the Counsellor accepts them on an equal basis and there is no pretence, enabling openness thus allowing the Client to have a deeper insight into themselves. The Counsellor will never attempt to deceive the Clien... ... middle of paper ... ... better position to use their knowledge, resources and energy to resolve problems now and in the future. To conclude the Cognitive Behavioural Approach is educational it uses structured learning experiences that teach Clients to monitor their negative thoughts and mental images. The goal is to recognise how those thoughts and images affect their mood and behaviour making them feel depressed or anxious etc. The Counsellor teaches important coping skills, such as problem solving and making time for pleasurable experiences although it only works on the here and now problems not on problems from within the past i.e. childhood, it is time based and not open ended. Some critics argue that due to this focus it does not address the possible underlying causes such as an unhappy childhood though one approach that does look at this aspect is the psychodynamic approach.
This approach would have a person take immediate responsibility for their feelings as actions in the present moment; focusing on and exploring feelings as they occur. The ideal humanistic solution is that a person’s problems will diminish as they get in touch with their feelings.
There are multiple structures of that can be applied to the counselling process, ranging from the basic idea of a beginning, middle and end to a more structured approach as that proposed by Egan (1994). Although his initial structure offered three main components; Stage 1, exploring the situation, stage 2, identifying a new or desired scenario to strive for and stage 3, the action stage, in which methods of coping are devised of and implemented. Egan later devised a ten stage structure that still takes into account initial stages from the speakers perspective of identifying a problem and seeking help, within this structure stage 4 is the initial meeting of the counsellor and client and can be considered the beginning stage of the helping re...
Therapy is as unique and diverse as the people who seek it. There are many types of therapy that are used to treat different kinds of problems. There is no perfect or absolute form of therapy, because therapy varies for each person. One of the branches of therapy is humanistic therapy. This therapy is considered an insight therapy, along with psychoanalytic therapies. However, there are differences between humanistic and psychoanalytic therapy. Humanistic therapy focuses on self-development, personal growth and responsibilities. This type of therapy guides the client to find their own answers. The therapy focuses on emotional awareness: how the person feels versus why that person feels that way (Oltmanns & Emery, 2012).
Humanistic Theory is based on the ability for individuals to be able to separately diverse with our own prospective on life. Maslow’s theory speaks to the potential and to positive outcome of human motivation and believes that every individual can and will strives to be more.
Nelson-Jones, R. (2008) Basic Counselling Skills – A Helper’s Manual, 2nd edition, London: Sage Publications.
While Freud took a psychoanalytic perspective, psychologists Abraham Maslow and Carl Rodgers saw a humanistic perspective on personality. Maslow believed that motive of personality was that human intentions formed a hierarchy of needs. This meant that when basic needs were fulfilled, people would strive toward a state of self-peace and tranquility, knowing that their basic needs were met. Rodgers believed similarly to Maslow. He believed that people were essentially good. He believed that extending a positive and open environment to another person led to unconditional positive regard, which is an attitude of complete acceptance towards a person.
Humanistic psychology relies on client centred therapy and the idea that each individual has the potential to achieve a position in their psyche named self actualisation. Humanistic psychology differs from psychodynamic theory in that it is optimistic about the human psyche and does not view conflict as inevitable. Humanistic psychology assumes people attach meaning to their unique perspectives on the world and that behaviour is strongly influenced by this. Carl Rogers defined the healthy personality as being one that had congruence between the perceived self and the experienced self and that the individual in question experienced unconditional positive regard from their parent or guardian. He defined an unhealthy personality as being one which lacked these components. Abraham Maslow alternatively suggested a hierarchy for which a person’s healthy personality could be measured by stages of psychological and physical needs (see diagram 2). He suggested that, for a person to achieve self actualisation and become a fully functioning person, they must first satisfy all the needs of each level in the pyramid before moving onto the next
7. Woolfe R. & Dryden W. ( 1996) (ed.) Handbook of Counselling Psychology, Sage Publications: UK
...roblems. On the other hand, the humanistic approach, introduced by Abraham Maslow, states that individuals have the freedom and capacity to direct his or her own future. Although it is a theory, it is apparant that the psychoanalytic approach is accepted in our society through observations of our speech and procedures of our criminal justice system. As a result, it is conclusive that it is more instrumental in the treatment of mental disorders.
This essay will attempt to highlight and evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the three main theories of counselling within the module covered this term. The three approaches in discussion are psychodynamics, cognitive behavioural and humanistic.
Abraham Maslow wrote the Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theory. This theory was based on fulfilling five basic needs: physiological, safety, social, esteem and self-actualization. Maslow believed that these needs could create internal pressures that could influence the behavior of a person. (Robbins, p.204)
Two proponents most noted for humanistic approaches to personality are Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers. Both the Person-Centered Theory (Rogers) and the Hierarchy of Needs (Maslow) considered that humans ' true nature was good and that each has the potential for growth. A comparison of the two approaches demonstrates a compatibility between theory and practice. Furthermore, each approach focuses on individual choices and rejects the theory that biology will determine human potential.
...xplain freedom and personal growth of a human and called as the third force of psychology. Client centered therapy was proposed by Carl Roger. The major concept of Roger’s theory is “self”. Roger developed the concept of fully-functioning person and believed proper communication between the client and the therapist is the basement of the therapy. Abraham Maslow focused on positive side of human’s mental health and Used Hierarchy table to explain human needs, figure 2:
The counseling session began with the introductions where I introduced myself as the counselor and later introduced my client. This stage is important in any counseling session since it is the time of exploration and focusing according to Gerard Egan as quoted by Wright (1998) in his essay on couselling skills. It is in this session that I was able to establish rapport and trust with my client in order to come up with a working and fruitful relationship with him. During this stage I made use of skills like questioning, where I would pose a question directly to my client, sometimes I would choose to just listen to what the client wanted to speak out while in some instances I would be forced to paraphrase the question if I felt the client did not understand the question I had asked previously. There were also other times when I would reflect through silence. During such a period, I got time to study the client and the information he had given. This being a difficult area, since some clients may not be able to volunteer information to you as the counselor, I decided to assure the client of confidentiality of any information he was willing to share with me with a few exceptions which I also told him about. Being open to him about the only times the information may not be confidential was part of my building rapport and establishing trust with him. I therefore, decided to ask the client what information he wanted to share with me and lucky enough he was ready to speak to me about different issues that he was going through.
The following essay will look at what it takes to be an effective and professional counsellor through discussing what counselling is, its processes, the setting in which it is undertaken, the characteristics, necessary skills needed and the ethics involved in counselling.